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“Given the prices in Paris, it’d have to.”
She laughs richly. “That’s good. I like that. I’ll have to remember that when I call home.” She leans forward. “How are you doing with that wretched pounding?” She says the word in English.
I cringe. “Awful. Can we talk about what a twisted power play this is?”
“To make the people who can least afford it stage an elaborate dinner party just to ‘play the game’?” She uses air quotes.
“What did you do for yours?”
“I ruined everything. I served them boeuf bourguignon made with forty cloves of garlic and the cheapest red wine I could find, cooked down until it could have patched a tire. Wilted lettuce. Scorched crème brûlée. And then I dressed in sweatpants and proceeded to get drunk throughout the meal. It was glorious.”
“Holy shit!” I’m so shocked I say it in English. “Why would you do this?”
“I told Hughes and the rest of my department that I was protesting. This was not in my contract. Fuck them.”
I blink at her. “I don’t even know what to say. And they didn’t fire you?”
“No. But they didn’t give me tenure either.” She shrugs elegantly and pushes her thick blonde hair off her shoulder, like it was worth it.
“I wish I had your courage,” I admit. “I could use it right about now.”
“Ooh! This sounds like a story I want to hear!” She puts down her coffee. “Come on. All of it. What is that expression? Spill the tea.”
“I really can’t. It’s complicated.” A shadow falls across the table and I tense, simultaneously hoping it’s Levi and that it’s not.
“Hi!” the man says. He’s trim, with brown hair and brown eyes. He has an easy smile. “I just saw you two here and I wanted to stop and say hi. I don’t think you remember me. I’m Anthony Davis in Anthropology. We met at the first meeting of the semester.”
Delphine raises her eyebrow at me and checks him out before giving me an amused assessment that means, You could do worse.
“Anthony! Of course!”
“We were just discussing the pounding,” Delphine says, graciously moving into English. “Tell us how you weathered it. Bastien’s is scheduled for Sunday afternoon.”
He rolls his eyes. “God, what a stressful nightmare. I had a vegan, a keto diet enthusiast, and a type 2 diabetic at my table, and I made vegetarian meatloaf.”
“How does that even work?” I ask.
“I don’t even know. All I remember is when they left I got myself stinking drunk.” He crouches next to the table so that he’s looking up at me. I smile back at him. “Tell you what,” he says. “If you like, we can work on the menu. I was going out of my mind beforehand. How about we have coffee at Book Nook on Saturday morning? That way, we can plot out a strategy for you on neutral grounds.”
“Where’s that?”
Anthony smiles at me. “Oh, it’s on Constitution Avenue. It’s the big four-story brick Victorian office building. You can’t miss it.” He straightens his cuff. “And bring your syllabi. I’ve been here four years and there are things nobody tells you until you’ve already done them wrong. Did you already get the don’t rock the boat speech?”
Delphine snorts. “It’s not a boat. It’s a raft, and they’ve already eaten all the interesting ones.”
Anthony looks vaguely confused, but he smiles pleasantly. “What did they eat?”
I pause, because I think she just referenced the shipwreck of the Méduse, in which case the answer is that they ate each other. The conversation stalls while he’s waiting for me to answer, because I’m not 100% sure that I’ve got it right.
“You must make something very Canadian,” Delphine says, completely dismissing Anthony. I breathe a sigh of relief that I haven’t committed myself to a cultural reference I barely remember.
“That’s a good suggestion,” Anthony says. “So, are we set for the Book Nook? Their coffee is really bad, but they do have books to waste your time on.”
“I…” I think of Levi and swallow. I need to make better choices. “Ten o’clock, then.” I smile at him.
“Good.”
His smile widens. “Well, I’ll let you two go back to your conversation. See you at the Book Nook, Bastien.” He beams at me, and then at Delphine, and stands, taking his coffee with him.
